“Every word, and not one of them makes a bit of difference.”
She dried her eyes on the sleeve of his coat. “It doesn’t, does it? Not to you, anyway.” She eyed him strangely. “They’ve told me some of what you’ve done. Not to my face. I’ve listened and overheard a lot of things. Tarragon talks on the phone in my presence, sometimes. You’ve done impossible things. Inhuman things.…
“I know. I don’t know how I’ve done them. It’s as much a mystery to me as it must be to Tarragon and his mentors. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that we’re together now and nothing can—”
She stopped him with a finger to his lips. “No, Eric. It’s important. It might explain everything. I’m not supposed to be capable of loving you like this, and a nonprofile man is not supposed to fall in love with me. But I do love you, and you love me. I can only think of one thing that explains what’s happened to us, explains what you’re done.
“Eric, you have to be an artison yourself.”
He wasn’t shocked by the suggestion. She thought he might be, but he wasn’t.
“I’m not an ignorant person, Lisa. I’ve considered the same possibility. There are certain tests you can do. I applied some of them to myself, when I was left alone back in Nueva York. Attisons are perfectly human, to all outward appearances. But there are tests that can tell.” She stared anxiously at him.
“I’m not an artison, Lisa. It was one of the first things that occured to me when”—he hesitated—“when I began doing things no human being should be able to do. I know that somehow I’m special. Only a blind man could deny it. But I’m not an artison. I failed every one of the tests. I didn’t have access to a laboratory, but I did have access to the Nueva York library, and to local drugstores. I failed every test, Lisa. I didn’t pass a single one.”
“Then what are you, Eric Abbott?” she asked softly. “What are you?”
“I don’t know. Different, but not like you. Different in some other way. I’m a design engineer. I know how to run tests and interpret results. I agree it would have explained everything, and I almost wish it had. But it didn’t. I’m no artison. More than a human, certainly, but in what way I’ve no idea.
“It doesn’t matter, truly it doesn’t. Someday we’ll find out. All that matters now is that we love each other. Can you accept that, for now, as enough?”
“If you can accept what I am and still love me, Eric, then I can accept anything.” She searched the cathedral’s interior. “We need to start thinking, start planning our escape. Not from London, but from Britain. I know it’s impossible to stay free forever, but you’ve made me want to try. They’ll track us down eventually, but a few days, or weeks, of happiness will help me live out the rest of my life. I’ll always have those memories to turn to.” Her eyes were bright and she looked more alive than he’d ever seen her.
“We’ll give them a run for it, Eric! It won’t be easy. You’re a wanted man, and me, I’m an expensive product, difficult to replace. Let’s make them work for me!”
“We’ll do more than that,” Eric assured her. “You keep saying there’s no place we can hide from them, nowhere outside Tarragon’s reach? Well I’ve been thinking, and there is such a place. We’ve been talking about it for the last ten minutes. WOSA needs colonists? Well, it’s just acquired another two.’ ’
She tried to hide her smile. “That’s a wonderful idea, Eric. Unfortunately, it can’t work. It’s impossible. Of course, my falling in love with you is impossible. Your falling in love with me is impossible. Sitting here now, holding you close, instead of lying dead downriver or back in Nueva York is also impossible. So I suppose I shouldn’t be intimidated by still another impossibility.”
“No indeed,” he told her, eyes shining. “But we have to wait here a few minutes longer before we can begin.” He settled himself against the ancient bench.
“But why?”
There was a strange, beatific expression on his face. Beneath the dome, the voices of the choir soared. “I’ve always loved Vaughn Williams.”
Tarragon was accustomed to operating independent of government interference. He reported to an authority which regarded regional governments as nuisances, relics of a dying past.
Despite that, or more likely because of it, he regarded the upcoming interview with apprehension. The trip across the frozen surface of Lake Lucerne had been made in eerie silence, the skifoil skimming the ice while fat snowflakes drifted down to melt against the windows, and the craggy majesty of the Alps rose like pale ghosts behind the storm clouds.
The entrance to the mountain was deceptively calm, the immense metal doors moving aside to admit him quietly, the ranks of armed, alert guards noting his every step. Inside he found himself plunged into an organized maelstrom of activity, bumped and nudged by rapidly, moving programmers and processors while his escort maneuvered them both ever deeper into the bowels of the Authority.
Then the escort left him alone outside a door. It was a perfectly ordinary door, identical to dozens he’d passed during his descent. The voice that bade him enter, however, sent a chill through him, a new sensation for Tarragon. Every informed human being on Earth knew that voice.
“Come in, please.” He entered.
The elderly man who sat staring at several optos matched the voice. Tarragon looked past him, at the optos. The information displayed was incomprehensible to him.
How tired he looks, Tarragon thought. He always looked tired during his public appearances, but never this worn. He wondered if they used makeup on him for his opto speeches.
“It’s me, sir. I have an appointment. Tarragon?”
“Tarragon? Oh, yes, the man from North America.” Oristano swiveled round in his chair and extended a hand. He did not rise.
“How do you do, Tarragon.” He gestured toward a nearby couch. “Please take a seat.”
Tarragon did so, feeling a little more at ease. While the Chief of Operations and Programming still presented a formidable appearance, it was much less impressive than he’d anticipated. What Martin Oristano represented, however, was more than enough to awe his visitor.
“Excuse me, sir, but I still don’t know why I’ve been told to report to you. I’m not used to being yanked from an unfinished assignment, especially one as baffling and frustrating as the one I’ve been concentrating on this past month.”
“I am quite familiar with the problems you’ve been having, Tarragon, and believe me, I sympathize.”
Tarragon nodded, unsurprised. The CPO had access to everything that happened on the planet. “Then there’s more to this business than I’ve been told?”
“Quite a bit more.”
“That still doesn’t tell me why I’m here, or why I’ve been pulled from the case.”
“You haven’t been ‘pulled from the case,’ Tarragon. You’re still assigned to it. You’ve been brought here to be filled in. You see, the Colligatarch itself has become interested in the exploits of your Mr. Abbott.”
“I knew it.” Tarragon nodded as he shifted nervously on the couch. It was too soft for his taste. It made him want to relax. “I knew there had to be more to that man than met the eye. I didn’t believe the reports until he slipped out of our grasp in Nueva York. And then when he escaped from us a second time outside London, and then right in front of … have you been told what he’s done?”
“As I said. I am familiar with the relevant details.”
“I’m sure you are, sir, but it’s one thing to read about them on an opto screen and another to stand in front of a hole in a solid concrete wall that your quarry’s just walked through. It’s another thing to watch him vanish before your eyes before sleep gas and a dozen shells reach his body. What am I dealing with here, sir? I have to know what I can expect in the future.”
“I understand, Tarragon. In turn you must understand that this business has put many important people, including myself, under a considerable strain. I’ve spent more time on this matter than intended, and now it appears little enough time remains.”
“There is still enough time,” said a new voice. Tarragon’s eyes swept the room, saw no one. Then the small hairs on the back of his neck rose as he realized who the voice must belong to.
